A quick break from politics to slip in some religion. I’ve read a couple of things recently pointing out what is obvious but somehow ignored: Religious people are obsessed with the gays! (and if Desmond says it, you know it must be true). The latest in a long, long line is Senator Craig, who just to be clear is totally not gay, OK?

Now I’m not going to say that their opinions on homosexuality are wrong (they are, but that’s not my concern here). There’s certainly a reading of the Bible that would back up their view for Christians and Jews, and while I’m less informed I’m sure something similar is true in the Koran.

So it might be wrong, but there is a case to be made. But, to bang once again on my most quoted statistic, a child starves to death every 5 seconds. It is utterly inconceivable to me that any god worthy of praise would want us to focus on which gender some guy loves when through pure indifference a child dies in the time it takes to… well, what the hell can you do in 5 seconds? Turn the TV on? Scratch your arse?

Should the matter come up in conversation I see no reason to hide your dislike of homosexuality, or adultery, or broccoli (it’s your right to appear as foolish as you choose), but otherwise, to quote the great philosopher Chandler Bing, “Big picture please!”

This was broadcast on Radio 4 (national radio station for older people) last week. If you’re religious you might not like it – even I was discomforted at the time, though only by the occasional stunned silence from the audience; the content is pretty much spot on. Somehow I don’t see this making it on US radio, even on NPR.

(HT: Pharyngula for the video)

I was going to bring you a funny lolcat today, but courtesy of Pharyngula I can beat that: Behold the lolcat Bible

One of the cornerstones of debate about religion is the idea of God’s plan. A common objection to the idea of God is the ‘Problem of Evil‘, which questions how evil can exist in a world governed by a benevolent god. One of the prime responses is that what we see as evil isn’t really so, it’s just our lack of understanding of God’s plan that makes it appear evil.

I can’t argue against that (well actually I can, but for our purposes I won’t now). What puzzles me is that this is seen as a defense of religion. One person dies of malaria every 30 seconds. Now I consider myself quite an imaginative person, at least judging by the amount of daydreaming I do, yet I am utterly unable to conceive of a plan that requires a person to die every 30 seconds from a bug bite. One person every 30 seconds, almost all of whom will be unknown to more than a few dozen other people.

I contend that if you truly believe that, then you have lost all basis for, well, pretty much anything. If you think that a plan so utterly incomprehensible to mere humans is in play, then it seems unavoidable to think that literally anything could be part of that plan, including having your god lie to you about what he wants. Certainly I struggle to understand how God so loves us that he lets one of us die every 30 seconds, in or out of His faith.

Update: This is an old article that I finished off today, and the link no longer works. The latest figures I could find are around 1-3 million deaths per year, which is consistent with the one every 30 seconds)